


Born with Two Right Feet

by 2towels



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Blood, Dialogue Heavy, Established Relationship, KeithxSwords, Klance Week 2017, Klance Week 2017: Welcome Home, Love Letters, M/M, Secret Admirer, Self-Indulgent, Swearing, klanceweek2017, lance cuts his foot that's all, my favorite tag, only a little this time, this isn't late at all I have no idea what you're talking about
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-23
Updated: 2017-05-23
Packaged: 2018-11-04 03:27:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,535
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10982397
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/2towels/pseuds/2towels
Summary: The mail included cards from his sister's latest photography retreat in Spain, two bills, a few scattered pamphlets from fashion subscriptions Lance continuously begged for coupons for, and, at the bottom of the pile, a single folded up piece of paper. Curious, Lance set the rest of the mail onto a counter as he reached the kitchen and flipped the top fold of the paper upwards, stilling as soon as he registered the contents. The bottom flap fell open accordingly.In a sloppy line, sections of letters were cut out from magazines and pasted into a series. An honest-to-god magazine letter.I saw you this morning, it read,your shirt looked good on you.--Lance starts receiving mysterious messages, written in a murderous style.Klance Week 2017 Day 4: Welcome Home





	Born with Two Right Feet

Thursdays were the worst day of the week. Not quite enough of a thriller to look forward to in the grand scheme of work, only being a bridge between hump day jokes and TGIF montage emotions, Thursday served, if there had to be one during the week, as only a filler.

Lance, an excitable boy by nature, hated Thursdays. They were always the same: wake, school, work, home, bed. After his return to sleep, he could wake up for a much more eventful Friday, and his days could be filled with cramming as much fun and excitement as he could into his stressful last year of school. So, after a long Thursday shift of school and waiting tables at Altea, a local banquet hall, Lance lethargically pushed into his apartment with with a weekday defeat in his bones, ready for a face mask and the same routine that always fell on Thursdays.

"Babe," He whined loudly, closing his eyes leaning against the door as soon as it had closed behind him, "Want a bath? My dogs are barking, my kittens are mewling, my head is pounding."

Two deep, tired breaths later, Lance realized there was no reply, and slowly lifted his head from the heavy wood. "Keith?" He called, a little louder, through the apartment, suddenly wary. Keith wasn't out often without plenty of warning--he tended to not go out unnecessarily at all, actually, unless they were going camping or anything that didn't involve the density of their apartment complex or city.

When again he received no reply, Lance stepped through the little walkway into their apartment with a vague level of irritation even past his usual post-work. Why wouldn't Keith be home without texting him? He grumbled as he set his bags down at the end of the short pony wall, scooping up the mail left over for him to sort through and trudging to the kitchen. As he passed the living room couch, there was no tell-tale lump of Keith nor any Discovery channel churning on from the television, and that only served to irritate Lance more. It wasn't late enough for the irresponsible man to actually be sleeping in their bed, unless he was sick, and he wasn't sick, because Keith Kogane didn't get sick, and when he did he sure as hell would not take care and consideration to sleep early enough.

The mail included cards from his sister's latest photography retreat in Spain, two bills, a few scattered pamphlets from fashion subscriptions Lance continuously begged for coupons for, and, at the bottom of the pile, a single folded up piece of paper. Curious, Lance set the rest of the mail onto a counter as he reached the kitchen and flipped the top fold of the paper upwards, stilling as soon as he registered the contents. The bottom flap fell open accordingly.

In a sloppy line, sections of letters were cut out from magazines and pasted into a series. An honest-to-god magazine letter.  _I saw you this morning,_ it read,  _your shirt looked good on you._

Past tense. Wordlessly and with uncomfortably shaky hands, Lance sauntered back to the front door and locked it slowly. "Keith?" He called again, a little eager to see his boyfriend's face as he finally made his way to their bedroom. The letter was still in his hand as he entered the boyfriend-less room, and he gave it one more glance as he took a deep breath. There was no signature, or anything marking its source, outside of the magazine letters themselves.

_Where are you?_ He found himself texting Keith, feeling unsettled. It was a weird message, one that could have been left in his mailbox and just scooped into his mail pile mindlessly as Keith sorted it this afternoon, but Keith wasn't an inefficient mail sorter. He would have caught the strange letter and already called Lance to rave about its origins if he knew or if he wanted to know. That being said, the letter had to have been left there by someone, but it...didn't seem like Keith's genre of weird to send creepy magazine messages with vague implications. Or, maybe it was, but Lance was tired and Keith was missing and the letter in hand was freaking him out. He set it in the bottom drawer of his nightstand, along side his old electronic iTunes dog he couldn't bear himself to throw away and all other creepy toys and items he'd received in his twenty-two years of being alive. His survival drawer, he'd explained to Keith as he un-boxed horrible things into it, reminding himself of all he'd overcome so far when needed.

He undressed almost petulantly, not sure what to make of the night's events, and completely forgot his skin care routine or even to brush his teeth before he crawled into bed and glared at his charging phone from his pillow. Somewhere between deciding just to fall asleep and actually beginning to lull, his phone pinged with a single message from Keith,  _With Shiro be home soon._

When Keith crawled into bed what seemed like hours later, he did so with hands so soft and gentle that Lance completely forgot about the letter in his tire, instead enjoying his not-missing boyfriend and curling up to sleep like a dead man with him. In fact, the letter slipped his mind for days, until another one showed up, laid carefully on the coffee table after a day at school.

_You're sweet._ It read, magazine letters and all, with a cotton candy Dum Dum lollipop taped to the bottom of the page. No context, no source.

Keith was at work, had been for hours and would continue to be for more, and Lance, again, got up to lock the door with a pinched brow and trembling hands. Staring at the closed and locked door, Lance felt for his phone and fumbled to snap the side button a few times. Within minutes, it was ringing with  _Toy Food_ , and Lance picked up with a calm, "Hunk."

"You alright, man? It's been a while since you used the emergency button." He commented lightly through the receiver. When Lance was silent a moment, his tone became much more serious, "Are you in danger? Do you need to me to figure out your position? Pidge is right next to me, just give me yes or nos if that's all you can do. Lance?"

"Chill a moment, Hunkydory." Lance said, turning to set the letter on the pony wall beside him and rip the lollipop off. Cotton candy. Bright blue, easy to confuse for blue raspberry, the hardest Dum Dum flavor to find, and Lance's absolute favorite.

"You're...the one who used the button." Hunk explained patiently, recognizing his best friend's false calm attitude.

Lance spun the lollipop in his free hand. "I got a letter a few days ago that said I had a nice shirt on. Today I got a letter that said I was sweet."

"That's nice," His friend began carefully, "Do you have a secret admirer writing you stuff? Keith'll get real pouty about that."

"They weren't written." With a slow, silent deep breath, Lance took the note and lollipop across the apartment to where he'd left the first one, "They were cut out. They were magazine letters cut out. Like in the cartoons. And murder stories."

"I--think that's a myth?" Hunk tried haltingly, admittedly hesitant the more he thought about it, "You found them...in your house?"

"Yes."

"You're going to die." Pidge said into the receiver suddenly, "It was nice knowing you, Lance."

"Pidge--Lance, you're not going to die. Lock your doors and windows." Hunk tried to cut in from a distance. “You might die a little, but keep stuff locked and you probably won't.”

Pidge ignored him, continuing on, "Find Keith's old wooden swords and keep them beside you at night, and practice picking up his real swords from their displays so when the time comes you pick up the right ones fast without fumbling on all that decorative ribbon."

Lance found himself nodding along as he stuffed the second letter with the first. "Why are you so ready to give advice for this?" He asked, eyeing the newest sword Keith had impulse bought and left at the edge of the room in preparation to display. It would probably go next to the...bright red handled one on the living room wall. He was sure Keith had mentioned the name of it at some point, but he knew the names of swords as well as Keith knew the names of lotions, so they were on equal grounds.

“I live in a dorm with a frat girl, I've been sleeping with self-defense weapons under my pillow for _months._ ” Pidge explained impatiently, and Lance couldn't even remember the name of her roommate when he tried to think of her face.

“So, ready the swords.” He said, sitting on the edge of his bed. “All the windows are always locked because Keith's paranoid. The door always is when we leave, too.”

“That's not paranoia,” Hunk cut back into the receiver, seeming as if he'd finally obtained his phone back if Pidge's distant scoff was anything to go by, “That's just sanity. You guys live in a terrible neighborhood.”

Lance huffed, offended for his apartment complex despite knowing exactly what his best friend meant. It wasn't...the cleanest seeming place, but it was home for them for now. “A terribly _cheap_ neighborhood.” He boasted, trying to tilt his voice back into the enthusiasm he preferred.

“We're at the library,” Was Hunk's careful reply, “Wanna meet us there and go out for something to eat? Or come over to my place and I'll cook?”

Lance was nodding when he realized Hunk wouldn't see him, but Hunk seemed to read his mind before he could verbalize an answer anyway.

Before he hung up, he confirmed, “Awesome, we'll see you soon. Call me if you need anything else.” His best friend did know him well.

Once he'd set his phone back in his pocket, standing and leaving his bedroom with an eerie silence, he made his way to the kitchen to scrawl a note for Keith, in case he returned home first.

 _Baby,_ with a heart after the address, _I went out to Hunk's place to feed! I'll bring you something home for all your hard work at your terrible job, you stud muffin. Don't turn on Discovery, because if you're asleep when I come home I'm eating Hunk's inevitable offering to you._ For a moment, he debated writing down about the note, but saw no point to worry Keith about it, and it felt like something that should be shown or told, not simply noted on an otherwise intentionally cute message. He was a king at leaving notes for Keith, and Keith was a king at receiving them with a goofy look on his face whenever Lance caught him reading the sweet words. _Don't miss me too much,_ another heart, then one with an arrow through it before his name _, Lance, your darling, the light of your life, the warmer of your bed._

He stuck the letter to the fridge with a museum magnet they'd picked up a few weeks ago. Keith had seen the pamphlet for the new airplane exhibit and drank in the words with a silent hunger, each photo included being carefully examined. Lance had taken the hint, excited for such things himself anyway, and he was proud to note he had treated his boyfriend to an amazing day.

Realizing he was staring at the magnet, Lance shook his head to clear his thoughts and threw his coat back on, locking the door behind him as he made off for his best friends to spend the evening with them, and only circling back to double check that it was locked once. Hours later, Keith would grab the note with a hand swiping at the lower half of his face, trying to mask his goofy look even despite being alone in the home.

Lance returned a little after he assumed Keith would have, stopping at the sight of a note taped outside his door. The magazine letters sent a familiar unease under his skin. _Thanks for locking the door_ , it read, and Lance took a deep breath, _I hope you had a good day_. There was a section below the small message that looked like the words had been ripped off, but there was another line pasted just below that, slightly askew. _You have beautiful eyes._

“Why?” Lance asked nobody, knowing nobody else was in the hall. He peeled the paper from the door delicately and shuffled inside after he'd unlocked it. Keith greeted him from the couch, eyes alight a little unusually. Before him, Discovery Channel was churning on the television, and Lance mutely noted the subtle protest.

“Hey,” Keith's voice was soft when Lance didn't say anything himself. Lance crumbled the paper in his hand quietly, the action hidden by their pony wall. “How was Hunk's?”

“Fine.” He grumbled, wincing at his tone. After a breath, he pocketed the note to think about later, wanting to drink in his boyfriend's slightly ruffled features. “How was work?”

“Tiring.” Keith replied honestly, shifting in his seat as Lance drew near the couch, “Somebody threw up on the race track.”

One knee already on the couch and the rest of his body dipping forward, Lance paused to obviously eye Keith's attire. He was out of his work uniform, which was acceptable, and so Lance continued his pitch forward and landed square in Keith's chest, snuggling as soon as they'd made contact. Keith's soft hands were fluttering for only a second before settling in Lance's hair and on his back. “Go cart isn't for everyone.” Lance murmured into the soft fabric of his own t-shirt Keith had pulled on, “Is that why you smell like industrial cleaner?”

Keith swatted his shoulder, “I showered, nice try.” When Lance only grunted, Keith rubbed a small series of circles down his spine, asking softly, “Is something wrong?”

Lance shook his head slowly, moving his arms lethargically to pull Keith closer to himself as he rubbed his face in further. Keith hummed, but didn't say anything, knowing Lance got icy and threw his walls up when his moods were questioned. It wasn't routine for Lance to be the one looking wrecked from frustrations, but his boyfriend knew all the same how best to approach the subjects. If it was truly distressing, Hunk would have told Keith, because Lance would have asked him first in an effort to not worry Keith himself. There was a nice pattern to go by, at least, and he'd received no message from Hunk, so he turned down the volume on the television and nudged Lance around until he could get comfortable under him, fully expecting the two of them to fall asleep like such.

When Keith did wake up, nap induced delirium in full effect, it was to a black television and a Lance-less stomach. Immediately, he rolled his eyes, assuming his boyfriend had tried to wake him earlier and he'd ignored him in his sleepy state, which was a true routine of theirs.

With a yawn, he checked the time, noting it wasn't even late yet by both the glowing 07:43 on his screen and the soft light still holding out through the window. Before he could stand, or even glance, to look for Lance himself, a loud smash alerted him to the Kitchen.

He jumped towards the wall closest to him, grabbing the bright red sword on it's display, and bound the ten feet to the other room, ready. The stupid swinging door that separated the two spaces was silent as Keith eased it, but it was only Lance inside, who was not alerted to his creeping all the same.

Lance stood over a carefully crafted note that was familiar to Keith, beautiful eyes flicking over the pasted words heatedly. Feeling the stupid look coming across his face, Keith raised a hand to cover his goofy smile and watch Lance for his own reaction. If he could catch Lance's flush, even in the slightest, during a love-stuck look, as Lance often teased him with, then he could both die happy with the elation of such a look in his face and retaliate with his own evidence of Lance's inability to handle overly sweet gestures of affection between them.

 _You light up my life,_ the note said, and Keith was flustered remembering the words but glad to convey them all the same, _Sometimes I see you and wonder how I could be so lucky_.

“What the _fuck_?” Lance whispered and Keith flushed harder, not prepared for the strength in his voice. When he turned and saw Keith standing in the doorway, sword in hand, he glanced down at the plate he'd dropped and huffed, looking back at the note instead. Keith could tell he was making a strange expression, trying to reel in his giddiness and the lifting feeling in his stomach, but Lance didn't seem anything but calculating.

“What?” Keith coughed when Lance's eyes lingered on the note for too long again.

A deep, steeling breath came from his boyfriend, and Keith cleared his throat in anticipation, trying not to look to eager for his reaction. “Don't freak out,” Was the first strange thing Lance uttered, “But some creep has been leaving me weird messages, I think.”

“ _What_?” Keith harped, this time with much more free feeling. Lance startled at his voice and held a placating hand up, trying to calm Keith's storm, “What do you mean 'some creep'?”

His boyfriend shuffled, holding the paper out with his other hand still poised in a calming gesture, “You know,” He said plainly, “Some creep. A stalker. Hunk said to call the police if I kept getting them.” He seemed uncomfortable at the notion, at least, a grimace coming across his face, “Don't look so mad, we don't even know who wrote these.”

“ _I_ wrote these.” Keith hissed, snatching the paper from Lance's outstretched hand. They watched one another with wide eyes at the confession.

Lance squawked first, _“You_ wrote them? _Why_!?”

Furiously, Keith spat, “Because I love you! You deserve sweet notes! You were going to make the stupid face, why were they weird!?” He waved the paper with his sword-less hand as if he were carefully explaining a crucial point of a plan, but his face was all frustration and furious fluster.

“I—You put 'thanks for locking the door' in one! What do you mean 'why were they weird'!?” Lance shot back, his face tinting in the slightest warm shade, “How is that a love message?” He threw his hands into the air, taking a step back as if he were too shocked to believe the turn of events and face it closer.

“You always forget to! And then I get annoyed because it's not safe and I worry! So I thought you did it because you knew I wanted—it...to be...” Keith's words died at the sound of glass crunching, and Lance's body was rigid and still.

“Babe,” Lance said carefully, lifting his foot from the broken glass. His face contorted to a variety of different pained expressions before it finally settled on a soft pinching, “I may never dance again.”

“Holy shit.” Keith versed, stepping closer and ignoring Lance's long whine. He set the sword on the kitchen counter top beside the paper towel rack and reached forward for his boyfriend confidently.

“You don't have shoes on!” Lance warned rationally when Keith carefully stepped closer to the pile of shards and leaned over to scoop Lance into his arms and lift him, “God you lift too much.”

“Grab the dish towel.” Keith ignored him, adjusting his hold on him to walk out of the debris area and give Lance a moment to grab the towel as instructed. “That's a lot of blood.” His tone was almost conversational, and he cringed a little at it.

“We're going to the hospital.” Lance declared almost moodily, dislodging a chunk of glass from his foot and chucking it at the floor where the rest of the pile was. Blood streamed down where the glass had exited, and Lance began binding his foot with grumbles galore. “I can't believe it was _you._ My keys are on the pony wall, lets go.”

Keith lifted him again once his foot was bound and wandered through the doorway. “I didn't mean to freak you out.” He eventually murmured, “I thought it was nice...”

“Magazine letters.” Was all Lance said, pointing insistently at the shoe rack before Keith could fully exit. Getting the hint, Keith crouched and allowed Lance to scoop up a pair of slides so he wouldn't be barefoot the whole time.

When the door was closed behind them, Lance fumbling with the keys in his hand to lock it from his awkward position in Keith's arms, Keith tried to tame his pout as he muttered, “You like magazines...” And Lance, so surprised by the statement, laughed so hard Keith almost dropped him.

 

**Author's Note:**

> hello yes I can't stop laughing this was so weirdly funny to write??
> 
> Hope y'all like accidental stalker Keith!!! Love that loser.  
> I promise I didn't give up on Klance week for those wondering! I'll be posting the rest of the stuff tonight or tomorrow night, late or not!
> 
> Check me out on tumblr: [I take blurb requests and love talking to people!](http://2towels.tumblr.com)


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